Today Dana Milbank points out that the Republican Party is repeating a mistake of monumental proportions that the G.O.P. made 74 years ago following the passage of Social Security. This strategy of attacking a popular program as a reason for electing Republicans failed miserably for the next three election cycles that the G.O.P. continued to cling to it as a central plank in their platform.
Health reform and the specter of Alf Landon
By Dana Milbank
"This is the largest tax bill in history," the Republican leader fumed. The reform "is unjust, unworkable, stupidly drafted and wastefully financed."
And that wasn't all. This "cruel hoax," he said, this "folly" of "bungling and waste," compared poorly to the "much less expensive" and "practical measures" favored by the Republicans.
"We must repeal," the GOP leader argued. "The Republican Party is pledged to do this."
That was Republican presidential nominee Alf Landon in a September 1936 campaign speech. He based his bid for the White House on repealing Social Security.
Here's a couple of short excerpts of of Alf Landon's watershed speech for repealing Social Security that Dana Milbank referenced above:
It assumes that Americans are irresponsible. It assumes that old age pensions are necessary because Americans lack the foresight to provide for their old age. I refuse to accept any such judgement of my fellow citizens.
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Do we need Health Care Reform because Americans lack the foresight to provide for times of illness? No. Too many Americans lack an affordable mechanism to provide for times of illness under our country's present patchwork of a health care system.
And so bureaucracy will grow and grow, and federal snooping florish.
To get a workable old age pension plan, we must repeal the present compulsory insurance plan. The Republican Party is pledged to do this.
I sincerely hope that Republican candidates across the country rally around the cause of repealing Health Care Reform as their Party's new political mission. I also fervently hope that the Republicans make a vocal defense for preserving the prerogatives of the Big Banks to put our whole economy at risk, all for the sake of boosting the Big Bank's already obscene profits. With a combination of goals that toxic the Republican Party deserves to wander in the political wilderness for every election cycle until they abandon their doctrinaire rigidity.